Solvable Relativistic Hydrogenlike System in Supersymmetric Yang-Mills Theory

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  • Simon Caron-Huot
  • Johannes M. Henn
he classical Kepler problem, as well as its quantum mechanical version, the hydrogen atom, enjoys a well-known hidden symmetry, the conservation of the Laplace-Runge-Lenz vector, which makes these problems superintegrable. Is there a relativistic quantum field theory extension that preserves this symmetry? In this Letter we show that the answer is positive: in the nonrelativistic limit, we identify the dual conformal symmetry of planar N=4 super Yang-Mills theory with the well-known symmetries of the hydrogen atom. We point out that the dual conformal symmetry offers a novel way to compute the spectrum of bound states of massive W bosons in the theory. We perform nontrivial tests of this setup at weak and strong coupling and comment on the possible extension to arbitrary values of the coupling.
Original languageEnglish
Article number161601
JournalPhysical Review Letters
Volume113
Issue number16
ISSN0031-9007
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 16 Oct 2014

ID: 139036438